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tv   Shepard Smith Reporting  FOX News  April 9, 2019 12:00pm-1:00pm PDT

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five." it's greg gutfeld's turn to pick tout music. you'll want to close your ears. i'm dana perino. here's shep. >> shepard: it's noon on the west coast. 10:00 p.m. in israel. moments ago the polls closed in what could be a historic israeli election. the prime minister there, benjamin netanyahu is trying to become the longest serving israeli leader ever. he's facing a tough challenge from the retired military chief benny gantz. ahead, what's at stake ahead for israel and the united states. also, the "full house" actress, lori loughlin facing another charge in the college admissions school. there's word that even if she cuts a new plea deal, it could put her behind bars for years. reporting begins now.
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our reporting begins this tuesday afternoon with the attorney general, william barr, testifying on capitol hill regarding the mueller report. for you today, we have four headlines. first, attorney general barr says he expected to release the redacted report within a week. second, mueller had no part in the barr letter that we've seen on the matter. number 3, william barr will not release the full report to any committee of congress. fourth, barr refused to answer today whether the white house has seen the report or been briefed on it. lawmakers on the house appropriations committee grilled the nation's top law enforcement official on how he has handled robert mueller's findings on the russia investigation. the committee's chair woman said
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she's concerned that the attorney general was able to summarize nearly 400 pages in just a couple days. >> all we have is your four-page summary, which seems to cherry-pick from the report to draw the most favorable conclusion possible for the president. in many ways, your letter raises more questions than it answers. >> shepard: but william barr defends his decision saying the justice had been meeting with the special prosecutor so he had an inkling of what was in the report. >> the thinking of the special counsel was not a mystery to the people at the department of justice prior to his submission of the report. he had interacting, he and his people, had been interacting with the deputy attorney general and lawyers supporting the deputy attorney general in his
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supervision of the special counsel. >> shepard: democrats say they want the attorney general to hand over to the congressional committee the complete and unredacted report. attorney general barr said he would not do that. democrats will likely issue a subpoena. the redacted version, he said, will be color-coded explaining why the justice department withheld certain information. barr says there's four categories of redacted information, grand jury material, anything that could compromise intelligence. details related to ongoing investigation and then the last category. information that would unduly infringe on the personal privacy and reputational interests of peripheral third parties. mueller redacted. color coded for clarity coming soon. catherine herridge reporting live on capitol hill. catherine? >> shep, the attorney general testified that he has some
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discretion. he says his actions are bound by the law, by regulations and established practices at the justice department. unless he gets a cord courter, which would be sought by house democrats, there's no release of grand jury material and the other categories as well. here's the attorney general. >> this whole mechanism for the special counsel was established during the clinton administration in the wake of ken starr's report. that is why the current rule says that the report should be kept confidential. >> democrats pressed the attorney general on his finding that there was no obstruction of justice by the president in the course of this investigation. that was a finding that was reached with his deputy, rod rosenstein. but it was not a conclusion that was reached by special counsel robert mueller. here's that exchange. >> can you elaborate on what is meant by "does not exonerate the president?" >> that's a statement made by
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the special counsel. i reported it as one of his bottom-line conclusions. i'm not in a position to discuss that further until the report is out. >> there's a lot of questions today about the mechanics of what happened. what we learned is that attorney general bar offered robert mueller the opportunity to review the march 24th letter before it was set. but mueller declined. he said that he gave the white house a heads-up about that letter. not for input, but to read it to them over the phone. here's the final section from the attorney general. >> we did advise the white house counsel's office that the letters were being sent, but they were not allowed or even asked to make any changes to the letters. we did -- we notified them before we issued them. >> there were other headlines in the course of the testimony. number 1, the attorney general confirmed on the record that
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he's personally reviewing the actions that led to the rush probe, specifically the genesis of the counter intelligence investigation in july of 2016 and he put a timetable on the inspector general's report into allegations of surveillance abuse in the fall of 2016. he's saying he expected that in may or june. so just within weeks of the mueller report itself. >> shepard: thanks, catherine herridge. thank you. now separating rhetoric from reality when it comes to immigration in america. today president trump called out democrats, federal judges and his predecessor over problems at the border. he also said that he's planning to restart his administration -- actually what he reported is, he's not planning to restart separating undocumented children from their parents. here's part of what the president said this afternoon. listen for both the credit he claimed and the president he
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blamed. >> obama separated the children, by the way. just so you understand. president obama separated the children. those cages that were shown, i think they were very inappropriate. they were built by president obama's administration. not by trump. president obama had child separation. take a look. the press knows it, you know it, we all know it. i didn't have -- i'm the one that stopped it. >> shepard: president trump has made similar claims before. following are the facts. it's undeniably true that the roots of this issue stretched back many years. in 2005, president george w. bush launched operation streamline to arrest, imprison and deport those here illegally. fox news research shows officials gave children a pass. president obama continued the operation.
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however, the obama administration tended to keep families together. there were exceptions, but it was not the policy to separate. after president trump issued the zero tolerance order, officials did separate children from their parents. some families have not yet been reunited. president trump spoke about cages. it is true that some of the photos circulating online showed children kept in chain-linked ex-closures during the obama administration. for instance, this photo is from 2014. in that year, the obama administration saw a surge in children and families from central america. they started jailing families together as family units. according to the reporting of our corporate cousins at the "wall street journal" and others, "obama administration officials considered separating families, but opted not to do so." the trump administration did
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separate families. the trump department of homeland security estimates more than 2,300 children had been separated from their families by last spring. the trump administration did detain children in cages. an unknown number of those children is still not back with their families. president trump said today he is not reinstating his own child separation policy. john roberts reporting live from the north lawn. john? >> shep, good afternoon to you. a couple things for context here. the numbers of families coming across the border now is well above what it was back in 2014 when the obama administration was having so many problems detaining so many people. of those problems, they have not increased by any degree but they have dramatically increased. we're talking about two things. there's something called a binary choice. in the family unit is being detained, according to the law,
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which is under this flores agreement, children could only be held for 20 days before they're released to a family or care givener the united states or to a licensed federal program, this binary choice would allow them to keep the child detained with them or released. so that would turn it over to the parents. the other thing, the zero tolerance policy that has been discussed in the administration, whether or not to resume prosecution as the head of household family units that would separate the children. that's what the president said he's not considering restarting. listen here. >> we're not looking to do that, no. we're not looking to do that. thank you very much. it brings a lot more people to the border. when you don't do it, it brings more people to the border. we're not looking to do it. but president obama had the law. we changed the law. the press should accurately report it. they won't. >> the accurate reporting is
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that the zero tolerance policy about prosecutoring head of household was enacted under the trump administration. i just got out of a 45 minute briefing with a senior administration official about the changes going on at dhs. the reason why they're changing some of the leadership at dhs in particular, the secretary, kirstjen nielsen, looked like the u.s. citizenship and immigration services chief may be targeted here, because of what i'm told is the inability of the leadership to get the bureaucracy to move. you can see the u.s. citizenship and immigration services director. it's possible that he may be leaving. i'm told they're not looking at removing any deputies at this point. president trump earlier today in the same oval office pool spray denied that he was going through a housecleaning at dhs. listen here. >> i never said i'm cleaning house. i don't know who came up with that. we have a lot of great people over there. we have bad laws, a judge that just ruled incredibly that he
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doesn't want people staying in mexico. figure that one out. nobody can believe these decisions we're getting from the ninth circuit. it's a disgrace. >> in terms of the person who will take over the department of homeland security, the senior administration official says that kevin mcaleenan comes from a law enforcement background. nobody is more frustrated. this is about leaving everything on the field. there will be a renewed pressure on congress to make changes to the laws in an aggressive litigation strategy to back that up. some senior members of congress are telling the white house, whoa, stop with the changes. listen to chuck grassley here. >> they have the same philosophy of enforcing the laws that trump has. i don't understand why they would want to get rid of them. they bring a policy and
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intellectual rationale to what the president is trying to do. >> they have the same philosophy of enforcing the laws that president trump has but apparently they do not have the pull to get the bureaucracy moving at least to officials in the white house, shep. that's why the changes are being made. >> shepard: john roberts live. just in to fox news, exit polls have just been released in israel. they have contradictory results. the race is too close to call. updates live ahead. here at home, the feds say they have broken up a $1 billion scheme that targets hundreds of thousands of senior citizens on medicare. all the details on that. plus, this florida man bought an island. now the cops accuse him of stealing from kmart. but first, the feds handing more
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charges out in operation varsity blues. uncle becky, the tv actress, lori loughlin could spend twice as muff time behind bars. the news is coming fast on a tuesday afternoon. as a financial advisor, i tell my clients not to worry about changing their minds in retirement. you may have always imagined your dream car as something fast. then one day you decide it just needs to be safe enough to get her to college and back. principal. we can help you plan for that.
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>> shepard: to breaking news. "the full house" actress, aunt becky, lori loughlin, and her fashion designer husband have been hit with new charges in the college admissions scandal. they're among 16 parents indicted today on a charge of money laundering, conspiracy. tmz is reporting that if loughlin and her husband now want to plead guilty, prosecutors would likely recommend a sentence ranging from four years and nine months up to five years and 11 months. prosecutors say the couple paid $500,000 to get their daughters into the university of southern
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california as crew recruits despite the fact that they never rowed crew. felicity huffman not part of the indictment. yesterday we learned she plans to plead guilty to the original charges. huffman faces four to ten months sentence as part of her play. she paid $15,000 to rig her daughter's sat scores. analysts say some of the accused parents might have been able to avoid additional prison time and charged that they quickly owned up to their actions. trace gallagher reporting live. trace? >> shep, for lori loughlin, her fashion designer husband and these 14 other parents, this is hot water. legal experts say as a rule there's very few slaps on the wrist when it comes to money laundering. the reason the grand jury indicted for money laundering is because when the parents
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conspired with rick singer to cheat their kids into college, they funneled it through a charity that singer had set up. in other words, they tried to hide it and make it appear clean. not only won't prosecutors accepted plea deals without jail time, they want at least two years. in some cases those that fessed up early and cooperated and could have avoided all-. some plan to fight it in court. for lori loughlin and her husband, jail time is more of a strong possibility. >> more fall-out for felicity huffman, right? >> yes. she pleaded guilty yesterday and might avoid jail time. her reputation took a big hit. netflix announced that her new movie won't be released. her film, "when they see us" will launch may 31 for now. lori loughlin's daughters are in education limbo.
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usc says they cannot withdraw or register for new classes until their cases have been reviewed and there's no word how long that will take. and loughlin's youngest daughter, olivia jade, might need a english brushup court. she was denied because she wrote makeup, setting separate and lip gloss. the product should be separated by commas so they don't appear as one product. her application has been accepted. shep? >> shepard: thanks, trace. live in los angeles. the treasury secretary weighing in on a house democrat's request for president trump's tax returns. and tech executives facing questions from congress about how they're handling online hate speech. lots of news from capitol hill and it's coming up. billions of mouths.
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>> shepard: the treasury secretary, steve mnuchin, says his department will follow the law and is reviewing a house democrat's request to see six years of the president's personal and business tax returns. the chairman of the house ways and means richard neil asked the irs to hand over those returns. six years of returns from president trump. he says the united states tax code is very specific. it gives his committee authority to obtain anybody's tax information in the whole country. the white house then pushed back. this weekend, the chief of staff, mick mulvaney said lawmakers will never see the president's tax returns. mike emanuel reporting live. what happens now? >> shep, good afternoon. a short time ago, the treasury
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secretary was confronted by the chair of house financial services about the issue of president trump's tax returns. >> secretary mnuchin, will you comply with the law by the deadline tomorrow and furnish the tax returns even if it means you may be fired by this president for doing so? >> as i previously said, i want to acknowledge we have received the request. as i said before, we will follow the law. we are reviewing it with our internal legal department and i would leave it at that. >> earlier mnuchin asked if he had conversations with the president or the white house about turning over the tax returns. >> i have not had any conversations with anybody in the white house about this issue. i personally have not had any communication with anybody in the white house. i want do be specific that relates to me and not everybody at treasury. way tonight be clear and not misleading. i acknowledge there were
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conversations. i'm not briefed on the full extent of those conversations. >> also today, new reaction after the acting white house chief of staff mick mulvaney said on "fox news sunday" that democrats will never see the president's tax returns. the chairman was not amused. >> he's saying that shall doesn't mean shall. contempt of the law doesn't surprise me when some officials of the trump administration. >> as you mentioned, the chair of house ways and means set a deadline for the tax returns. it sounds like this battle will keep going. >> shepard: mike emanuel on capitol hill. today they had a hearing on the rise of white nationalism, white supremacy, anti-semitism and the like all across the nation. they had a hearing on that. so of course, the hearing streamed on youtube. while the hearing on
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islamophobia and white nationalism and all the rest was streaming the comment section below got so bad, so racist and so bigoted and so disgusting that youtube had to shut down the comment section. proof of the problem as the hearing streamed along. executive from youtube's parent company google and facebook testified about their role, the role their platform's play in spreading white supremacy and the rest. they say there's no plate for hate and extremism. but it's a complex issue when monitoring and evaluating speech across the globe. fox news and facebook have a partnership to deliver news on facebook watch. fox news is responsible for the content and production. the streaming part, the comment section is another matter. hillary vaughn reporting live on capitol hill. hi, hillary.
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>> hi, shepard. facebook and google saying today that fighting hate speech is a lot harder than it looks because what may be considered hate speech in one country may not be in another country. they also can't take down comments just because someone is saying something offensive and they also have to protect free speech while also trying to protect users from being attacked with hate speech. >> content can fit in a gray area. it comes against the line. may be offensive but does not violate youtube's policies. >> it's a constant tension that we wrestle with daily. we try to strike the balance. >> they're using technology though to help the fight. artificial intelligence, facebook alone, has a 30,000 person army whose sole job is to police this content. as you mentioned, we saw it in action. the comment section on youtube's live stream was disabled because
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of hate speech, shep. >> shepard: what are lawmakers saying about this particular hearing? >> both republican and democratic lawmakers saying that think that their opponents are using this hearing to launch political attacks at the other side. we did see a lot of political jabs fired across the aisle. because republicans and democrats questioned the motives of their fellow colleagues on this committee. >> i worry the true motivation for this hearing is to suggest that republicans are hateful and dishonest. >> some on this panel have tried to hijack this hearing and desecrate the lives lost to the hate crimes of white supremists by attempting to use this as an opportunity to promote a political position. >> shepard, there will be another hearing tomorrow for tech companies on censorship. >> shepard: hillary vaughn on the hill. thanks. the exit polls in israel show
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>> shepard: the breaking news from israel now. the polls are closed. they closed 36 minutes ago. their polls are open until 10:00 p.m. when they have these elections. at 10:00, they close. 36 minutes ago. now we're waiting to see whether the prime minister, benjamin netanyahu, one of the president's closest foreign allies will stay in power. the exit polls -- i know, exit polls -- not surprisingly are conflicting. they indicate the race is too close to call for now. should benjamin netanyahu win, he would become the longest serving leader in israel's history. he's facing multiple corruption
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scandals. a tough challenge today from the former military chief, benny gantz who says it's time for new leadership. gantz is billing himself as a centrist candidate who isn't too far left or too far right. under netanyahu, peace talks with the palestinians have fully broken down and he's pushed israel's policies much further to the right largely because he needs the far right wing parties to form a coalition government. netanyahu made a bomb shell campaign promise to annex parts of the west bank. a region where millions of palestinians live. the president has been a big factor in this election. netanyahu's campaign has been touting pro israel actions that the trump administration has taken including pulling down or pulling out of the iran nuclear deal, moving the embassy from
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tel aviv to jerusalem and recognizing the disputed golan heights as israeli territory. yesterday the trump administration declared iran's revolutionary guard was a terrorist organization. some analysts say the last one was a political gift to netanyahu before voters head to the polls. jonathan hunt is at the gantz headquarters. first to trey yingst who is leave at netanyahu headquarters. trey? >> shep, we just got word that benjamin netanyahu is going to come and rally his supporters while he declares victory in tel aviv. we understand his opponent, benny gantz is also declaring victory. when you look at the popular
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vote, two out of three polls indicate benny gantz has won. when you look at the top line numbers, two out of three israeli channels say prime minister netanyahu will have a clear advantage at 66 to 54 seats. the magic number for both candidates is 61. they're going to be looking to try to form a government over the next 42 days. they'll be given that opportunity. if they are able to do so, they will be given the nod by the israeli president to form the government. shep, i'm getting a note from my producer. i want to read it live. the prime minister has made one call tonight following the exit poll announcements to a smaller religious party and they have agreed to side with him. that shows you, shep, the urgency the prime minister trying to rally the support over the next two days as he tries to form a coalition government.
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shep? >> shepard: trey yingst live. let's go over now to netanyahu's opponent command post. he's live in tel aviv, jonathan hunt. >> shep, a sense of euphoria here when the first exit polls put up on the big screen behind me, which showed the blocks of would-be led by benny gantz of the blue white party neck and neck with the block that would be led by prime minister netanyahu. as trey mentioned, two other exit polls gave a more clear advantage to prime minister netanyahu. the air has gone out of this room to some extend as the crowd that gathered here realized that those other exit polls were showing a very different outcome. nonetheless, benny gantz, who has been campaigning on the idea that israel needs a fresh start, just put out a statement. i'll read it to you.
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it says "we won, the israeli public has had their say. thank you to the thousands of activists and over a million voters. these elections have a clear winner and a clear loser. netanyahu promised 40 seats and lost. the president should call on the winner to form the next government. there's no other option." so shep, we have to wait and see now. the exit polls not only are accurate as you pointed out. if benny gantz is not to become the next prime minister, he will form a strong opposition. what that opposition will try to do is try to keep the legal heat on prime minister netanyahu. he has the corruption charges hanging over him. if he forms a successful coalition is with the charges still in place, shep, there's going to be several months of uncertainty yet in israeli
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politics. shep? >> shepard: thanks, jonathan hunt and trey yingst as well. updates throughout the afternoon and evening. new details on news breaking this hour yesterday. three united states marines killed in afghanistan, three more marines wounded. at first, united states officials said an afghan contractor also died in the attack. but they now say they erred and he has survived. we're learning more ant one of the marines that did die. jennifer griffin reporting live. jennifer? >> shepard, one of the three marines killed yesterday was a decorated firefighter in the bronx. christopher slutman, 43 a 15-year veteran of the fdny and worked for ladder 27. he leaves his behind wife, shannon and three young daughters mayor de blasio and the fdny commissioner held a moment of silence for him. the work this marine had done as
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a firefighter had brought slutman honors. in 2014 he was awared the fire chief's association medal for rescuing an unconscious woman from an apartment in the south bronx. he crawled on the floor through flames to save her life. >> this up questionably is an example of the measure of this man. christopher slutman, an american hero. our hearts go out to his wife, shannon and three children. they will be in our thoughts and prayers. >> slutman is the fourth soldier to be killed this year in afghanistan. 1,425 new york firefighters are military reservists or veterans. slutman had two uniforms and committed his life to public
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service. the marines have not yet released the names of the other americans killed pending next of notification. >> shepard: thanks, jennifer. the feds say a medicare scam exploited senior citizens and cost taxpayers more than a billion dollars. now two dozen people are facing charmings including doctors. new york city's mayor just declared a public health emergency and ordered mandatory vaccinations as the measles outbreak grows worse. fact is, every insurance company hopes you drive safely. but allstate actually helps you drive safely... with drivewise. it lets you know when you go too fast... ...and brake too hard. with feedback to help you drive safer.
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and accessoriesphones for your mobile phone. like this device to increase volume on your cell phone. - ( phone ringing ) - get details on this state program call or visit >> shepard: now the senior citizen scam. the feds say a bill dollar scam targeted seniors on medicare. the justice department announcing charges against 24 people all across the country. they include doctors accused of writing fake prescriptions for medical devices that the patients didn't need at all. jonathan serrie reporting live in atlanta. jonathan? >> hi, shep. here's how the scam works. in some cases, telemarketers call you directly. in other case, they run tv and radio ads giving you a toll-free number to call for free
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orthopedic devices. today the hhs inspector general's office released a video to help people avoid being scammed. take a watch. >> if anyone other than your doctor's offices asks for your medicare number, you may be the target of fraud. people are reaching out to medicare beneficiaries to offer medical equipment such as braces, wheelchairs and diabetic test strips. >> the justice department has announced charges against two dozen people in california, florida, new jersey, pennsylvania, south carolina and texas. the defendants include doctors accused of writing fake prescriptions and owners of call centers, tele medicine providers and equipment companies. 130 of these companies billed medicare for $1.7 billion. the medicare program already paid out about 900 million of that, shep. >> shepard: john, did seniors on medicare lose money in this
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scam? >> the people targeted paid no money up front. federal investigators say they are still potential victims because they shared personal information, which can be shared on the black market, used for other crimes. they say it's very important if you believe that you are a victim of medicare fraud that you contact the health and human services fraud hot line immediately. the number is 800-hhs-tips. and authorities say it was tips to this hotline that helped them launch this investigation, shep. >> shepard: jonathan serrie, thank you. the new york mayor bill de blasio just declared a public health emergency in the nation's largest city, particularly in brooklyn, and ordered people to get vaccinations as a measle outbreak is spreading. he says the city has disease detectives trying to track down anybody that might have come in
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contact with the virus. >> it parallel what's a police detective does. if somebody has symptoms, they lock at what they have done, whwho they have been in contact with. as you heard, this spreads so quickly that you literally need to track down every person that someone may have come in contact with. >> shepard: new york is not the only place dealing with the measles outbreak right now. the centers for disease control and prevention in atlanta is also reporting outbreaks in washington state, california, michigan and new jersey. bryan llenas reporting live in williamsburg section of brooklyn with more on the new york city emergency. brian? >> shep, there's 285 confirmed measles cases in new york city. 246 are children and most are in the orthodox jewish community where vaccination rates are lower. this is in williamsburg,
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brooklyn. a jewish religious school. the school was connected to more than 40 cases. that's why the mandatory vaccination order, city health departments are urging all the kids that are not vaccinated to not go to school or the school risks being shut down. under the new order today, everyone in these four zip codes in williamsburg, brooklyn, must get vaccinated with the mmr vaccine. violators will be fined $1,000. this is the first mandatory vaccination order in the u.s. since 1905. the city acknowledged today the extra efforts being made to inform these communities. >> there's a very extensive outreach to community leaders, faith leaders. >> we've done mailings to 30,000 households, three rounds of robo
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calls and yiddish. >> the anti-vaccination message has spread throughout the orthodox community that the vaccines are up safe. that's not true. the measles vaccine is 97% effective in protecting people. shep? >> shepard: thanks, bryan llenas, a florida man has returned. this time, florida man happens to be a millionaire with a private island and also a problem with the police. but first, the british iron man showing off his toy. the inventor and former royal marine demonstrating his jet suit at an air base in england. he claims it can travel up to 50 miles an hour. there's word he had been in talked about providing his jetpack to british and u.s.
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military forces. they reportedly cost about $400,000 each. just days after buying a private idea -- -i call it my comfortable future plan.
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>> shepard: just days after buying a private island for $8 million in the florida keys, cops say a florida man tried to rip off a k-mart. rick leventhal have here with that. >> it's not just the stuff he allegedly stole, but it's the way that cops say he drew it. >> shepard: who is that? >> andrew francis lippey. he went to the local walmart and bought a coffee maker, light bulbs and a bed skirt. he put random things back in the original packaging and got $300 in refunds. these miss reports here say he put a basketball inside a keurig box, an older coffee maker many a hamilton beach office and a
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pillow case in a bed skirt package. he was with felony theft after he paid $8 million for thompson island. >> shepard: what more do we know about florida man? >> well, he's a lawyer. he's a member of the florida bar a graduate of the university of miami law school. he owns other real estate including a house that was used on mtv "real world" in the show's 17th season in 2006. almost 10,000 square feet. you can rent it for $1,000 to $3,000 a night. that is nice. >> shepard: what did you think of virginia? >> quite a win. >> shepard: low scoring, fantastic game. i felt bad for the red raiders. >> felt like destiny the way they won so many games last minute. >> shepard: i enjoyed it. you know, kind of pulling for
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the red raiders but it was a great game. i'm not thankful for staying up past midnight. too old for that. >> you like the underdogs? >> i like cavuto. it's his turn. >> can't hold this hearing without mentioning the elephant in the room. >> your unacceptable handling of robert mueller's report. >> within a week, bill in a position to release the report to the public. i am relying on my own discretion to make as much to the public as i can. >> all we have is your four-page summary, which seems to cherry pick from the report. >> this is what drives the public crazy, when they see something like this. this is what we have to try to avoid. >> i appreciate the importance as releasing as much of the information in the report as i